


Isenulf

by stabbitytuesday



Series: Canis Lupus Unfamiliaris [1]
Category: Six of Crows Series - Leigh Bardugo
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Gen, Spoilers, Spoilers for Crooked Kingdom
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-06
Updated: 2018-07-06
Packaged: 2019-06-06 10:26:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,614
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15192773
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stabbitytuesday/pseuds/stabbitytuesday
Summary: "You fight beside each other, sleep on the same furs, your rations are your wolf's rations. He is not your pet. He is a warrior, like you, a brother."Matthias Helvar is laid to rest.





	Isenulf

It was a little absurd, really. A Grisha making the trip to Fjerda more than once, and almost every trip of her own volition, to boot.

It would have been better, more respectful, if she’d spent the voyage belowdecks, sitting vigil at Matthias’ side. clasping his cold hand in her own, but Nina had never been good at cooping herself up, and the call of the sea, the salt in the air, Inej’s watchful eye from the Crow’s Nest..

The thought of joining him, closing herself bit by bit until nothing remained but a shell, was too damn tempting, even to one who’d never considered it in her darkest hours. A friend’s companionship, fresh air, they helped.

The trip north was quick, at least, and quiet but for a detour in Ravka to send the Ghafas home. She was proud of herself, really, for staying on the ship, for not giving in to the weakness curled around her spine that whispered how much easier it would be to let Zoya and Genya take over, lay her love to rest, coddle her in their own ways and hold her through the worst of it.

He deserved better than burial in a strange land. Even in her grief, she couldn’t stand to give him less than he deserved.

Inej, saints bless her, seemed to understand. Maybe if she’d been better at navigating, if she’d been less desperate the last time she’d been through, Nina would have known if they were truly in the same place they’d washed ashore, but every mile of frozen tundra looked the same to her as the longboat docked and she pulled a shovel from the bottom of it.

The crew had offered to help. Nina refused anyone but Inej, who never let the questions she had to have reach her eyes. He’d never wanted her to use her powers on him in life, using them in death would have been doubly disrespectful. Or maybe they were wrong, and he wasn’t present enough to care, but what else was there to do but guess?

She’d rowed to shore alone. It seemed right, that they end their journey the same way they’d begun it.

 

It had to have been hours, Nina’s hands had gone numb and her face would’ve been crusted in ice even if she hadn’t been crying. Did Djel have guidlines for graves? If he did, did He expect his followers to follow them even in death? Or would the intent be enough? She couldn’t know, really, and any god with no grace for His people, no respect for the best they could offer, wasn’t a god worth bothering with anyway no matter how much he’d believed in life.

But then, perhaps that was the cold talking. And the hunger. And the grief. And the sudden hot spike of fear in her stomach as a figure approached through the snow.

Damn. Shit. Fucking shit damn.

Reaching out was an instinct, the sort trained into her in the Little Palace, a Heartrender’s first impulse in a moment of fear. Even as she remembered her.. unique circumstances, though, Nina wondered if she’d ever have been able to manage the threat approaching on four legs.

As it sharpened in her field of vision, she realized she wouldn’t have.

A wolf, even a wolf alone, even against a Grisha, would still outmatch her in any fight.

Perhaps she would be joining Matthias in the afterlife after all. If she deserved his god’s favor, or he hers, or if they’d both managed to offend the heavens so deeply that They would have no choice but to send them to their own little corner of whatever world spirits wound up in. At least they would be together, she was sure of that.

Nina tried to stay still, to look as frozen solid as she felt, but the wind chose that moment to pick up and knock her forward to her knees. It must have been a trick of the light, or the icy plains, but the wolf seemed to be there in an instant, staring down at her and the shroud as though he was wondering if it would be worth the trouble to tear out her throat.

They say it’s unwise to look a predator in the eyes, that they take it as a challenge, that it frightens them into lashing out, and she should have remembered that as advice, rather than some half-forgotten bit of Should Have. But then, if she’d kept her eyes to the ground, she wouldn’t have seen the scar across the wolf’s muzzle, the line through his eye between blue and a speckled brown.

If she’d kept her eyes to the ground, she wouldn’t have understood immediately why this beast, (that she could swear was at least twice the size of any normal wolf) lay down across from her, his great head across Matthias’ chest, nose tucked under his chin.

“Trassel”

She didn’t realize she’d spoken until the wolf responded, glaring at her with a huff as though she was the terrifying intruder and he was just trying to mourn his master’s death. Which, she supposed, was true in a way.

It was beyond stupid to reach out, to softly lay her hand on the animal’s shoulder, and card her fingers through the coarse fur there. He should have ripped her arm off at the socket and been done with it, but whatever ferocity Matthias had seen in his companion seemed to have died with him.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t bring him back to you alive.” Her Fjerdan was stilted, her face too frozen to make the right sounds, but then he probably couldn’t understand her either way. “He loved you, and I know he missed you. He’d be glad you are alive and well.”

But he isn’t he seemed to say, with his great sad eyes, and Nina scrubbed at her face with her hands to keep the tears from crusting her eyes shut.

She wasn’t sure how long she sat, past long enough for Inej to worry, and probably long enough for her to start picking a search party, and none of it would bring him back. And so Nina stood, and glared down at Trassel, as though that would shoo him away. 

“It’s time, you know that. He wouldn’t want you to grieve.” It was a foolhardy thing to do, treating a wolf trained for battle like one of the stray hounds that had lived in the woods past the little palace, like he would be easily cowed, but Nina wasn’t thinking straight when she grabbed for his scruff and tugged him away from the body.

Matthias had told her that he had never known pain like that first bite on his arm, but Nina had assumed that was a child’s perspective, a new benchmark that was surpassed before long by some greater suffering. She was still fairly sure that was the case, but fucking hell it was a high benchmark to set, good fucking shit was her arm even still attached?

But she couldn’t scream, couldn’t cry, couldn’t crack in the least. He hadn’t, and she owed him and Trassel both that much.

It was only a moment before he released her arm, but it could’ve been hours or days or years that they stood, eyes locked on each other’s, watching for any sign of threat or weakness or fear.

Nina liked to think she’d be forgiven for tearing a scrap from Matthias’ burial shroud to wrap her arm, just to get her back to the ship. She knew she’d be forgiven for not giving him the dignity he deserved, shuffling the body one handed into the ground, covering as well as she could.

Something felt odd, as she started back towards the boat, too quiet, too wrong. It wasn’t until she turned that she realized it was the sound of one set of footsteps that was throwing her. Trassel hadn’t followed, simply settled to lay along the line of the grave, eyelashes frosting over as she watched his will begin to leave his body.

“No. Get up.”

He lifted that great head and stared at her, daring her to make him

“You know better than this. You know you’ll die if you stay there, and then what good would you do?”

What good was I doing before? he seemed to say. Or maybe he was just looking at her because she was making noise, and she was projecting every conversation she’d had with herself on the ship onto this one-sided exchange with a great smelly mutt.  
Nina had never really had dogs, not in her training, or in Ketterdam, and if she’d had one as a child she’d never remembered it. But it seemed instinctive to point at her own feet, to glare, to call him with the expectation that she be listened to and obeyed.

“He wouldn’t want you to die for him. He didn’t want you alone, and now you aren’t. So come.”

It was probably his training that sent Trassel padding over to her side, following her as she turned back towards the ship on no lead but her good hand wrapped in the fur at his scruff. She preferred to think it was Matthias, watching from the afterlife, to ensure his two greatest and only loves found some comfort from the loss of him. It was kinder that way, and they deserved a little kindness.

It would’ve been a kindness to warn Inej, or ask permission before bringing a wolf that could kill a man in his sleep on board, but she figured there had probably been enough kindness for the day.


End file.
